natursyn.dk

I would like to promote a youtube video of the Christmas carol, Silent Night, arranged and played by Claus D Jensen showing pictures from my photo album “Night“. You can read more about Claus’ work on his blog.

Merry Christmas!

A benefit of being a researcher is that you visit a lot of different places by attending conferences or doing research. The drawback, especially as a postdoc, is that you constantly have to apply for funding and move a lot. For now at least, I’ve secured funding for a while leaving me time to focus on my research full time.

One of the project I’ll be involved in is looking at food web ecology in the Catalan Pyrenees. The sampling probably won’t begin before 2011 but that didn’t stop me from attending a workshop in October on mountain ecology and climate change in Obergurgl, Austria. The most fascinating part was walking along a glacial moraine where a glacier has retreated with record pace the last few decades. I also went to the Catalan Pyrenees to seek out some potential field sites and to assist with retrieving data from thermostats in mountain lakes. A lot of the lakes were already frozen so at times we had to jump in a look for them.

Obergurgl in Austria

Obergurgl in Austria

Walking along the the Rotmoos moraine, Austria

Searching for thermostats. Engorgs-Malniu, Catalonia.

Alex is fetching a thermostat. Romedo, Catalonia

Mountain lake in Colomèrs, Catalonia

Walking in Romedo, Catalonia

Vall Ferrera, Catalonia

One of my favorite locations in Romedo, Catalonia

Since I broke off my stay at UC Santa Cruz have been a guest researcher at “Leibniz-Laboratory for Radiometric Dating and Stable Isotope Research”. Yiming & I are so fortunate to live in an apartment less than 2 km from the lab and usually I prefer walking there. Although Kiel is considered a dull and uninspiring town in terms of its architecture (80% of the old town was destroyed during the last war) it has many green areas with beautiful trees that I happen to pass through on my way to work.

I have not yet made much progress on my ongoing projects  partially because I’m waiting for new funding and partially because I’m getting trained in operating instruments in the lab. Right now I’m helping Yiming measuring hydrogen isotopes in plant waxes extracted from ocean sediment cores. Climate researcher are working non-stop these days to acquire such data because are informative of precipitation records in the past and how terrestrial plant communities have changed. This can lead us to a better understanding of the changes in temperatures and weather patterns we’re experiencing.

We live on this street

Farmer's market on Blücherplatz - next to where we live

Kiel's old water tower has kind of a Bismarck inspired style to it

Students from the nearby vocational training school in the background

Fall is here

The lab has the long and rather cumbersome name "Leibniz-Laboratory for Radiometric Dating and Stable Isotope Research"

In the first week of June, Yiming & I first went to Møns Klint in Denmark, then Potsdam in Germany and finally Skagen in Denmark. Møns Klint  (or in English ‘the Cliffs of Møn’) is one of the most geologically interesting sites in Denmark made of remains of shells deposited more than 70 millions years. As a biologist I’m always amazed at the large and unique diversity of plants and insects in this location. Next we went to Potsdam that used to be the residence of the Prussian kings and famously known for hosting the meeting between the  victorious allied leaders in the summer of 1945. However, we did not come to Potsdam to appreciate the historical sites but for attending a conference on stable isotopes. Since Yiming had an appointment in Northern Jutland right after the conference we hastily went back north. This time we visited another scenic area, Skagen where Kattegat and Skagerak meet, and Råbjerg Mile, which is a giant sand dune of about 1 sq. km.

View of Møns Klint

The Common Blue (Polyommatus icarus)

The landscape at Møns Klint is spectacular

Impressive gardens in Park Sanssouci

The New Palace in Park Sanssouci

Yiming sitting in front of one of the many gates in Potsdam

Yiming walking along the Skagen beach

Råbjerg Mile is a large sand dune of about 1 sq. km.

Yiming tried to take a picture of while I was jumping.

I have taken a leave of absence from UC Santa Cruz. My girlfriend Yiming fell ill a few weeks ago and to help her with a speedy and full recovery I am now staying with her in Kiel, Germany where she has a postdoc position. For the time being I am looking for funding or a position to continue my research in Kiel. I may come back to Santa Cruz this summer for a few weeks to do some sampling.

The day before leaving Santa Cruz I went for a walk in the university aboretum taking pictures of wildlife and flowers. The most exciting moment of the day was when I saw a bobcat.

Spring colors

Flowers

Old oak

View from below an oak

Resting deers

Bobcat

Anna's hummingbird (Calypte anna)

Anna's hummingbird (Calypte anna)

Allen's hummingbird (Selasphorus sasin)

Much of California has been influenced by human activities. In the Santa Cruz we have a former ranch where virtually all redwood trees were lost for lumber or to fuel kilns converting limestone to lime. Part of the ranch is called Pogonip, which is a beautiful hilly area where the trees have been allowed to grow back. I go running there every weekend and brought my little pocket camera along while it was pouring down.

Anna’s Hummingbird (Calypte anna) is the only overwintering hummingbird in Santa Cruz. It is also the most common hummingbird on the West Coast and is relative to other hummingbird medium sized (10 cm, ~4 g). Hummingbirds have one of the highest metabolic rates among vertebrates and their heart rate can reach 1260 beats per min (Lasiewski and Lasiewski, 1967)! To maintain this exceptional high metabolism hummingbirds primarily live off nectar. But they also feed on spiders and small insects to get proteins.

In the Arboretum located at UC Santa Cruz it is quite easy to get close to these birds when they suck nectar from Erica flowers. After a few visits to the garden watching their behavior I found out that once I sat still on the ground for a few minutes they would get within the shooting range of my camera. Beside the pictures displayed below, I have posted a gallery of hummingbirds here.

Last night I witnessed how people in Santa Cruz celebrated the historic election of an African-American as president of the United States. Thousands of people gathered in the streets, cheering, smiling and dancing after Barack Obama had held his speech in Chicago. It was very touching to watch.

Santa Cruz is among the most liberal counties in the US as 78 % of the voters cast their ballot for Obama. In the entire state of California 76 % of the 18-to-29-year-old supported him. In comparison only 36 % of young voters supported Obama in Alaska, my former state.

In spite of the enormous task ahead for Americans to make their country a place of equal opportunity, I find comfort and hope in the words that Obama spoke last night quoting from Lincoln: ‘Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection.’ May this also be the opportunity to set a new path for taking better care of this planet.

The complete transcript of his speech can be found here.

I also took a video of downtown Santa Cruz yesterday.

Santa Cruz is a place that attracts a great number of tourists and visitors. The biggest attraction of the town is undoubtedly its great surf beaches. On Sunday, Birthe, Carsten and I counted more than 250 people surfing on the waves. The conditions were apparently perfect because the waves were rolling perpendicular to the shore. We also saw people playing drums and playing with hula-hoop rings. What a great atmosphere!

For the three of us the greatest attractions were all the winged creatures from the thousands of monarch butterflies to  pelicans and hummingbirds. We probably saw close to 100 hummingbirds in the arboretum. On the hills behind Santa Cruz there are impressive forests with redwood. Because everything was forested in the area some 100 years ago the trees haven’t reached their full size yet although some of them are already reaching 70-80 m above the ground.

After spending nearly a month in Santa Cruz I got an opportunity to see one of California’s most beautiful places when my friends Birthe & Carsten came by to visit me. They began their 4 months travel through Northwestern USA in July from Alaska and made it all the way to Idaho on bicycles. To travel longer distances they then changed their mean of transportation to car. As anybody else visiting Yosimete I was taken by the size of the giant sequoias that can reach a height of 80 m and have a volume up to 1500 sq. m (that is just the trunk). Yosemite valley was also very impressive and beautiful. See more pictures from our 3 days trip here: http://picasaweb.google.com/natursyn/Yosemite